


break.

by clearascountryair



Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV)
Genre: 5x22 Spoilers, Angst, Canon Compliant, F/M, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, canon compliant character death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-21
Updated: 2018-05-21
Packaged: 2019-05-09 23:30:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,385
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14725659
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/clearascountryair/pseuds/clearascountryair
Summary: Maybe everything’s wrong.  Maybe it’s a misunderstanding, a miscommunication.(Everything is wrong, of course, but nothing is a misunderstanding.  Nothing is a miscommunication)





	break.

She doesn’t know how, but Daisy manages to drag her way back to the Zephyr.  She drags her way back to the Zephyr and the Earth is still intact.

(And, somehow, so is she.)

She drags herself in, bruised but not beaten, and Coulson is on the floor.  Davis sits on one side and Elena on the other and the first thing Daisy notices is how hard May is crying.

The second thing she notices is that Coulson is okay.

“Where’s Jemma?” Daisy asks.

Elena tells her, “the lab,” and Daisy notices she’s confused.

“Where’s Mack?” she tries, and Elena says:

“Jemma.”

So she tries one more time.  “Where’s Fitz?” and ignores the way May presses her fist into her mouth.  It’s the most terrifying image she’s ever witnessed.

She tries once more.

“Where’s Fi—”

Even from across the ship, Jemma scream is so permeating that Daisy almost thinks that it starts within herself.  From across the ship, she can still see the image she denies, the one where Jemma smiles because Mack’s alive and Mack cannot smile because Fitz is…

Because Fitz is…

And Jemma would not believe him.  Jemma would stand there and stare and shake her head because they have defied this universe and the next.  Because they just got married. Because, as mad as Daisy is, she cannot help the warmth within her whenever Jemma talks about the family she and Fitz will start.  So Jemma would shake her head, but would join those in their family who had already learned that Mack will always make it safe for you to break.

So across the ship, Daisy hears Jemma break and knows May’s face is not a nightmare, not a lying figment of her imagination.

Daisy cannot bear to look at her.

She wants to say “no.”

Because Fitz crosses time and space.  Fitz fights aliens and androids and himself.  Fitz does push-ups in the double digits.

She doesn't remember running away.  She’s running and she’s not sure towards what until Jemma pushes past her so fast that Daisy does not have time to stop herself until she and Mack run full force into each other.  But Mack, through his tears, does not seem to see her.

“Jemma!” he calls, and Daisy thinks it’s the first time he’s used he given name.

She turns and follows because, on one hand, she cannot see Jemma.  If she sees Jemma, it’s true.

But…

The whole hallway shakes and Mack pounds on the supply closet door.  He pounds and pounds and picks up his axe.

As she always does, Elena appears swiftly.

“Let her break, Mack.”

Mack shakes his head.  “You don’t know...You don’t…”

He turns to go and Daisy can see that Elena is too grieved to be angry.  They watch him go and Elena turns to her.

“Let her break.”

And, although she doesn’t, Daisy wants to scream, “I’m breaking, too!”

Instead, she sits down and presses her ear against the door.  “I’m here, Jemma,” she says. “I’ll be right here.”

She looked up at Elena, her face set on staying.

Elena took a deep breath.  “We’ll be…” She trailed off, glancing over her shoulder in the direction she came.  She sighed. “We love you, Jemma. We’ll be here when you ready.”

With a final glance down at Daisy, Elena leaves.

Daisy pulls her knees to her chest.

No one’s said it yet, she thinks.  She doesn’t really know. Maybe everything’s wrong.  Maybe it’s a misunderstanding, a miscommunication.

(Everything is wrong, of course, but nothing is a misunderstanding.  Nothing is a miscommunication)

She thinks, _I forgive you_ , and remembers that he’s not there to forgive and her teeth throb under the pressure of clenched jaw.  She shakes and, selfishly, wants Jemma. For all those solitary years of existence, Daisy doesn’t think she can bear this grief alone.

There’s a soft thud in the hallway and Daisy forces herself to look up.

Coulson is limping toward her, the fire in his face almost masking the pallor of his pain.

“Simmons!”  He walks right up to Daisy and bangs on the door over her head.  “Jemma, please open the door. We need you.”

Daisy looks up, unsurprised at Jemma’s silence.

“Jemma, it is time to come out.”

Daisy wants her to listen, she wants to hold Jemma and she wants to be held.  But Daisy wants to shake Coulson—let her have an hour, a day, a lifetime to process it all.

On the other side of the door, something crashes.

“Fitz is dead!” Jemma shrieks from inside.  

Daisy wants to vomit.  It’s the first time she’s heard it, she’s let herself think it.  

Jemma continues to scream.  “My husband is dead.”

The sounds that follow seem to slice Daisy open and she fears losing every organ necessary for life.  But she hears Coulson say her name as he fixes her with his stare.

She shakes her head.  “No.”

But she can’t deny him and pushes herself up off the ground.  She wonders if she should warn Jemma, but doubts she would be heard.  She holds her hand over the doorknob and watches it shake and crack and Coulson pushes the door open.  Daisy breaks

Jemma is standing there, her eyes wide open, looking in any direction for anything, any sign, and hope.  She’s bouncing desperately up and down with one hand pressed against her screaming mouth as the other shakes uncontrollably in front of her face, unsure where to land.

“Jemma.”

Jemma shakes her head, her whole body moving with the force of it.  She leans to the side, letting one of the closets’ shelves support her weight, even a boxs tumbles off it, its contents breaking on impact.  Jemma’s sobs leave her body in shouted, coking breaths and Daisy does not know what to do.

But Coulson pushes past her and, although he can barely support himself, he pulls Jemma to him, determine to hold her up too.  He pulls her tight and muffles her screams in his shirt.

All Daisy can think is, _Fitz put on his wedding shirt this morning_.  She wonders if Jemma’s thinking that too.

“Your husband is dead, Jemma.”

And perhaps this is the first time she’s heard it, but with a shuddering gasp, Jemma falls silent.

“We need to talk to Robin,” he continues.

Jemma pulls away, shaking her head.  “I don’t...I can’t…” She presses her fist into her mouth to stop the sobs as she searches for words.  “I don’t want to be here. I don’t want the future. I don’t...I can’t...I was going to change my name.”

It’s hard for Daisy to focus on Jemma as she frantically pushes the tears from her own eyes.  But she tries. She looks at her friend who had just become the Fitzsimmons she had been for years and has now become a half of an irreplaceable whole.

She never thought she would live in a world without Fitzsimmons.  She wants to tell her that she’s still Fitzsimmons. Being a widow won’t change that.

She doesn’t ever want to say widow out loud.

Coulson wraps his arms back around Jemma and Daisy wonders who he is supporting in doing so.

“Your husband is dead,” he repeats.  “But your boyfriend?  He cryogenically froze himself for seventy four years so that he could propose to you.”

Daisy freezes, even her tears ceasing their movement down her cheeks.  Based on the silence, Jemma has stopped breathing as well.

Coulson swallows audibly.  “You husband is dead and I cannot change that.  I would do anything if I could, but I can’t. But I can promise you, Jemma, you will see Fitz again.”

With one arm still wrapped around Jemma, he reaches out with the other, beckoning Daisy to them.  He kisses first Jemma’s head and then Daisy’s.

“Take me somewhere nice,” he whispers to them.  “Leave me somewhere beautiful and mourn the past.  But don’t stop fighting for your future.”

Daisy feels him shake and, using her strength, lowers all three of them to the ground.  Still trembling, Coulson backs up against the wall, keeping Jemma and Daisy on either side of him.  He lets out a shaky breath.

“You have a beautiful family,” he tells them.  “And I am so proud of the futures you’re still making.”


End file.
